Prospective evaluation of gastric emptying in the self-poisoned patient

Hypothermia: An Unusual Indication for Gastric Lavage

“…outcome and it may cause significant morbidity" (5). Multiple articles have suggested that after 1 h, digestive processes will have already dissolved the coating around ingested tablets, thus rendering gastric lavage less useful (6,7). In healthy human volunteer studies, recovery of ingested markers has been shown to be 90% at 5 min, 45% at 10 min, and only 30% at 19 min (8 -10).…”

Decontamination

“…AC is safe when used as described [64][65][66][67]. The main side effect is aspiration [68,69], and this is generally seen in patients with alterations of mental status and depression of the gag reflex [69].…”

Therapeutic Approach to the Critically Poisoned Patient

“…Studies of AC in patients with ingestions are difficult to interpret as they include patients receiving multiple types of decontamination in addition to AC or have serious methodological or statistical flaws. Merigian et al investigated the outcome of 451 asymptomatic patients who received either 50 g of AC or no treatment and did not find a statistically significant change in clinical outcomes between the groups [236]. Buckley et al conducted a retrospective, non-randomized study on 981 consecutive patients admitted following acetaminophen overdoses [237].…”